Society
Lebanese society is very modern and similar to certain cultures of Mediterranean Europe as the country is "linked ideologically and culturally to Europe through France, and its uniquely diverse ethnic and religious composition a rare environment that at once Arab and European. It is often considered as Europe's gateway to Western Asia as well as Asia's gateway to the Western World.
By comparison to most other Arab capitals, Beirut is more westernized and more socially liberal. Compared to Damascus, Cairo, and Baghdad, and especially in contrast to such cities as Riyadh, Beirut is more tolerant with regard to relations between men and women, and also with regard to homosexuality.
Notwithstanding the persistence of traditional attitudes regarding the role of women, Lebanese women enjoy equal civil rights and attend institutions of higher education in large numbers (for example, women constituted 41 percent of the student body at the American University of Beirut in 1983). Although women in Lebanon have their own organizations, most exist as subordinate branches of the political parties.
While gay sex is technically illegal, Beirut has a number of gay bars and nightclubs, in addition to two LGBT rights organizations, namely Helem and Meem.
Read more about this topic: Culture Of Lebanon
Famous quotes containing the word society:
“I had withdrawn so far within the great ocean of solitude, into which the rivers of society empty, that for the most part, so far as my needs were concerned, only the finest sediment was deposited around me. Beside, there were wafted to me evidences of unexplored and uncultivated continents on the other side.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“Our society is run by insane people for insane objectives.... I think we’re being run by maniacs for maniacal ends ... and I think I’m liable to be put away as insane for expressing that. That’s what’s insane about it.”
—John Lennon (1940–1980)
“A society made up of individuals who were all capable of original thought would probably be unendurable.”
—H.L. (Henry Lewis)